There was another pause, and the two pairs of eyes sought each other, and the heavy-lidded, slumberous eyes of Boris flickered and faltered beneath those of Paul.
"I am about to present to you an argument," continued the baronet, "which unswervingly follows my present conception. Long experience of this wicked world—by which I mean that particular kind of vulture-like humanity which preys upon better men than itself—enables me to assume that you are without question a blackmailer, a bad blackmailer, and a blackmailer of no common type.
"But I have also learnt this, that no blackmailer can stand alone. His offence is the most cowardly offence in the world. A blackmailer is always a coward, and a coward is invariably afraid of isolated action. I am therefore very certain that you do not stand alone in this attempt."
It had come upon Paul suddenly that this man was connected in some way with the scene he had witnessed at Lucerne—that he was the one for whom the fat man had acted as agent. And then, in a flash, he recalled the name "Boris" which Mademoiselle Vseslavitch had spoken; at that moment, too, Paul placed the personality of the Frenchman Virot. He and the fat man of Lucerne were one.
Boris's eyes left those of Paul and studied the panel behind the baronet's head.
"I should say," Paul continued, "that you were the headpiece, the brain-piece, of a well-planned scheme of crime."
The faint colour in Boris's face became fainter still. Paul believed he was pursuing the right trail.
"Now with such men as yourself—mind, I am not speaking so much from knowledge as from an intuition as to what I should do myself were I placed in similar circumstances—it is probable that you have sufficient intelligence, not only to rob your victims, but to rob your friends.
"Another piece of life's philosophy that roughing it has taught me is that the robber is always poor. I come, therefore, to the natural deduction that you are hard up."
Paul's whole expression of face changed suddenly. The coldness left it. And his keen eyes smiled with a smile that invited confidence from the man before him.